My coming-to-the-conference adventure, Only me...
Friday morning, I get packed and
ready to leave. The plan was pretty simple: rent a car
at 10:00, be on the road by 11, get to BWI around
3-4:00. Yeah, right...
I show up at Enterprise at 10:00, with my family in tow.
Upon exiting the car, my son makes a beeline for the
bushes. Now, my son is about 80% potty-trained, but
still has some accidents, so he wears pull-ups. And
usually, when he runs and hides, it means he is doing
something bad into the aforementioned pull-ups. So, I
dig him out of the bushes, and sure enough...
So back home we go, to change the stinky little guy. I
tell my wife to wait in the car, I'll just be a minute.
Well, this would be a bit more than a minute. Upon
removing his pants, I made a horrifying discovery. His
pull-up, which is supposed to act just like a diaper,
had failed. Horrible, miserable, toaster-like failure. A
blowout on his left cheek had run down the entire length
of his leg, leaving your gagging, dry-heaving author in
a world of poopy.
About 45 minutes later, after showering my son and
calling in the Haz-Mats crew, we returned to Enterprise.
The clerk informed me that, because I was using a bank
card and not a "real" credit card, that I would need (1)
A work pay stub; (2) A copy of a utility bill; and (3)
our marriage license (WTF?!?). I should have offered my
son as collateral. So, off to work to get a pay stub,
even though I have direct deposit. Then off to LIPA to
pay the electric bill (we had a partial balance from
last month, and they needed a statement saying it was
current). Then, our marriage license. Oh. Our marriage
license is in Wisconsin, from my wife's trip earlier in
the year. So, off to Babylon town hall, to wait in line
for over an hour, to get a duplicate of our marriage
license.
We finally get back to Enterprise at about 3:00, which
was the time I was hoping to arrive at BWI. And now, I
would be going through NYC traffic at rush hour. So, my
best-laid plans went into the crapper (pun intended).
After clearing the city, I was traveling on the New
Jersey Turnpike when I realized I had to make a stop. A
poopy stop. Despite my trepidations, I pull into the
Walt Whitman Rest Area, find an empty stall, gag at the
conditions, and go to work.
About a minute later, the bathroom entrance door flies
open. Someone runs in, in obvious distress. He was out
of breath, and gasping. Immediately I deduced why this
individual was in distress, out of breath, and gasping:
He was about to detonate. Oh, lovely. He quickly runs to
the stalls, banging on every door to find a vacant one.
After banging on my door, the next door over flies open.
Oh, look! A vacancy right next to me! Maybe we could
share stories!
He slams the door shut, throws his pants on the floor,
and lets fly.
Now, I've never been to a space shuttle launch, but my
brother has. He described It as the ground shaking, to
the point of feeling like someone had grabbed your shirt
and shook you. Well, now I can say that I know what it
feels like to watch a shuttle launch, as the force of
his blasts shook the ground, to the point of feeling
like someone had grabbed my shirt and started shaking.
But that wasn't even the worst of it.
The entire time this was happening, he was voicing his
relief. Not discreetly, either. Every foul expulsion out
of his schfincter rocket was accompanied by "OOOOHHHHH!!!
AAAHHHHH!!! OHHH THANK GOD!!! OH, THANK YOU JESUS!!!
OOOHHHH THANK GOD!!! And so on. As I sat in disbelief,
in a New Jersey rest stop stall, the gentleman next to
me was having what sounded like the loudest orgasm in
the history of the world. Even a "Jesus Christ!" from a
neighboring stall did not dissuade his expression of
relief/pleasure.
Of course, the first thing someone asked me when I
finally got to BWI was, "Hey... got any stories?"
